Since Binurong Point in Baras town was opened to tourists, the primary beneficiary of the influx of sightseers has been the barangay, particularly the barangay council and the barangay tour guides for obvious reasons.
The other Sunday’s incident in which a cow lunged at a 12-year old girl who was visiting the place along with her family. It is just fortunate that the girl managed to grab the cow’s horns before she was thrown a few meters away, with the tour guide showing the animal away. Nevertheless, the incident proved traumatic for the girl, who barely ate for several days and refused to go to school.
The question now is what the barangay council will do to prevent a repeat of the incident or risk letting its cash cow, pardon the pun, run away.
It must be understood that the entire scenic Binurong area, except naturally for the foreshore, belongs to a private owner, the Sorreta family.
Entry to the sprawling property was made possible through an arrangement between the owner and the barangay council headed by Chairman Emerito Tariman.
It should also be understood that the grassland through which tourists hike to get to Binurong Point has been a grazing land for the Sorreta family’s cows for decades now. Recently, according to knowledgeable sources, the provincial government even asked the Sorretas to allow the use of the grazing land in the administration’s milk production program intended to reduce malnutrition among children in the island.
Rather than ask for assistance from the Department of Tourism, Chairman Tariman should now use part of the barangay’s earnings from the tourist spot and start constructing a fence to separate the grazing cows from human visitors. The fence does not have to be concrete since a bamboo one with wooden posts can serve to provide separation between animals and humans.
Tourist guides who depend on the site and its visitors for their livelihood will not find it hard to volunteer in helping put up the fence.
They should realize that the Binurong property owners can close the area if they so desire and the consequence would be adverse for the barangay and the entire province.
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For the past month, at least two have died and a number of passengers injured in vehicular accidents caused by drowsy driving.
A driver of a construction company was killed when he failed to make a turn up in the mountains of Caramoran and plunged down an embankment. Reports say the man had been drinking alcohol the night before and most likely lost sleep.
Last week, a sleepy van driver veered off the highway in San Miguel town, with the vehicle slamming right into the steel bucket of a parked payloader, resulting in the death of a passenger and injuries to several others.
Drowsy driving or driver fatigue led to about 72,000 accidents, 44,000 injuries and 800 deaths in 2013 alone in the United States, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) reported.
The most common causes of drowsy driving include the following: inadequate, interrupted or fragmented sleep; chronic insomnia, narcolepsy and other sleep disorders; a work schedule that affects amount of sleep or disrupts one’s circadian rhythm; driving for too long without a sufficient rest period; use of sedatives, hypnotics and other sleep aids prior to driving; consumption of alcohol or drugs; and, any combination of these factors.
While existing law (the Anti-Distracted Driving Act, for example) addressed drunken driving or similar violations, the matter of getting enough sleep so one could drive safely depends entirely on the driver.
It should be noted that a bottle of beer is just the same as 150 ml or 1/5 of a bottle of wine and about two shots of hard liquor, and more than three servings of any combination can cause intoxication, according to experts. But, even one serving of alcohol can cause a person to become drowsy.
A person becoming drowsy have the following symptons: difficulty focusing, frequent blinking, or heavy eyelids; daydreaming; wandering/disconnected thoughts; trouble remembering or missing traffic signs; repeated yawning or rubbing of eyes; hard time keeping the head up; drifting from your lane;the last few miles driven; missing exits or traffic signs; or feeling restless and irritable.
It is best to get to a rest stop to take a power nap before driving again.
The best way, of course, is to get 7-8 hours of sleep before a long drive and better still, have another driver who can take over after every two hours. Don’t drink alcohol and, if possible, don’t drive between midnight and 6 A.M. Caffeine from coffee and similar drinks will help for a few hours.
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LAST RITES. A priest is preparing a man for his passing over. Whispering firmly, the priest says, “Denounce the devil! Let him know how little you think of him!”
The dying man says nothing. The priest repeats his order. Still the man says nothing.
The priest says, “Why do you refuse to denounce the devil and his evil?”
The dying man replied, “Until I know for sure where I’m headed, I don’t think I ought to aggravate anybody.”